


and with that autumn wind blowing

by anonymousAlchemist



Series: Terrible AU's to break your heart. [4]
Category: Over the Garden Wall (Cartoon)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-28
Updated: 2014-12-28
Packaged: 2018-03-04 00:39:00
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,176
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2902955
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/anonymousAlchemist/pseuds/anonymousAlchemist
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“Go home,” Wirt says, in a ringing two-tone echo of a voice. “Go home, and forget about me.”<br/>“I can’t,” says Greg. “Who would refill the lantern?”<br/>“Beatrice. Or the old Woodsman. His daughter. Go home, Greg. Please.”<br/>“I can’t,” Greg says again. “I’m not leaving without you, Wirt.”</p><p> </p><p>(The one where “He who kills the Beast, becomes the Beast.” A companion to my Beast!Greg piece, exploring the more widely suggested AU of Beast!Wirt. Part of my “Terrible AU’s” series.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	and with that autumn wind blowing

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [Burdens](https://archiveofourown.org/works/2619080) by [anonymousAlchemist](https://archiveofourown.org/users/anonymousAlchemist/pseuds/anonymousAlchemist). 



> scenes from a life after learning you can never go home again.

The Beast looms over Wirt. The Beast says,

“Are you ready to face true darkness?”

Wirt looks into the Beast’s lantern-bright eyes with a furrowed brow, and says, all adolescent defiance,

“Are you?”

 

He blows out the flame. And the beast shrieks, a scream like a slide of metal on glass, nails on chalk, this is the extinguishing of something mythic and terrible. For a moment, Wirt dares to hope, even as he drops the lantern from his hands and claps his hands over his ears.

 

And in that brief moment Wirt knows.

 

He can feel the beating heart-soul of the woods and the soft mists threading, he can see the withering vines curling in on themselves, the improbable angle-shadows of tree trunks,  he feels the steady thump-thump and knows the Unknown like it has been intravenously injected into his veins, all his bones and ligaments replaced by earth and shadow and branch.

Wirt screams. He collapses to his feet, dropping the empty lantern.

This is what it is to touch the lingering deaths of so many. This is what it is to feel the tenuous threads between body and soul reverberate deep within you like some sort of metaphysical heart, to hold in your rib cage the flimsy boundary between life and death.

The Beast is the Edelwood is the Unknown is the Beast. It’s all cyclic. The Beast devours the Edelwood so that the Edelwood might not choke out the Unknown with all it’s lost souls. It’s all necessary. There is no Unknown without the Beast, and there has to be an Unknown because there must be that waypoint between time and space and life and death and the Edelwood trees must be cut down lest they clog the entire forest.

One does not exist without another. There must be always be a Beast.

 

Wirt ş͉̜͕̫͜͜ ̧̥͍͓̦̭̱c̙̻͍̦̞̝ ̴̡̺͍̺̱̘͎̀R̦͉͉̣ͅ ̴̹͍̲̥̘͉͈̩͜Ȩ̨̟̠͔͍̗̦̩͞ ̜͍͓͍̭̮̗A҉͍̜̤̺͓͕̟ ҉̝͎̻̼̝͔̳͇M͉̝̱͘ͅ ҉̨̪̺̳S̘̰̲̀͘, and the lantern relights.

  


Wirt opens his eyes, and they are empty-flame-bright.

 

__________  

  


The world shifts. There is a moment of horrified silence. Beatrice, still perched on Greg’s shoulder, stares.

“Oh no.”

“Beatrice,” Wirt says, in a shaking voice that is not quite his own, that reverberates with a wavering echo, “Could you take the lantern, please?”

“Y-yeah.”

She flies over to right the lantern and perches on top of it. The Woodsman flinches as Wirt walks over to him.

“Could I borrow your axe?”

The Woodsman mutely hands it over.

 

Wirt takes the axe by the handle, and hacks his brother free of the Edelwood in silence. He gathers the discarded branches in one hand. He gathers his brother up in another. He leaves the axe where it falls. Beatrice flaps over, straining to carry the lantern.

“Wirt, where are we going?”

“I don’t know. Maybe the old mill? Uh, where are we, anyway?”

He turns to Beatrice and notices her struggling with the light.

“Oh. Wait. Nevermind, here. I’ll take it.”

Beatrice hovers for a moment, hesitant. Every instinct, every bit of lore she’s learned by being raised in the woods tells her that she should not let the Beast have the lantern.

Everything she’s learned about Wirt over their journey together tells her she should.

 

She lets go of the lantern and alights tentatively on Wirt’s shoulder. He scoops it up in a hand that looks no different than it did ten minutes ago.

He looks back at the Woodsman.

“Are you-Are you coming with us?”

The Woodsman shakes his head, leans his hands on his knees and rises to his feet. Solemnly, he says,

“Nay, I must return to my own household. I must give my daughter a proper send-off. Good luck to you all.”

“Okay. Um. Good luck to you as well. I-I’m sorry about your daughter.”

His eyes soften. He looks at them. “Thank you.”

 

They part ways. The snow crunches under their feet. The shadows cling to Wirt like creeping vines.

The lantern light disappears into the dark.

 

_____________

  


They reach the old mill at dawn, and Beatrices flies ahead of them, unlocking the door with a key hidden under the welcome mat.

 

“How did you know where that was?”

“I used to live here, before I got turned into a bluebird.”

“Wait, this was your house?”

“Yup. We can put Greg in the downstairs bedroom. Gosh, what’s with the mess in the mill?”

“That may have been us. Uh, sorry.”

“I don’t want to know.”

 

Wirt trudges inside and drops the kindling in the front parlor.

 

“Where’s the bedroom?”

“Down this hallway. Here, I’ll show you.”

 

Beatrice flies over, and Wirt follows, still holding Greg and the lantern. He’s trying not to think too much about what just happened, when he’s worried about his brother it’s easier to ignore the horror he’s become, the new sense of treeswhisperingbrightpinpricksoulslostlostdevourhungersoonsoonsoonohgodohgodohgodwhatisheohgod-

 

“Wirt?”

“Uh, sorry. Coming.”

 

Wirt sets the lantern on the bedside table and deposits Greg in the bed unceremoniously, and folds the (slightly dusty) blankets over him with a crisp sort of care, as if he is afraid to touch his younger brother now. He stares at Greg for a moment.

 

“He’s going to be alright, right?”

“Greg’s going to be fine, Wirt.”

“Are you sure? No, wait, why am I even asking you. How would you know?”

 

Beatrice doesn’t answer. Wirt sighs, sticks his hands in his pockets. Starts to apologize. Stops. Oh. Wait. He pulls out sharp scissors that fit neatly in the palm of his hand.

 

“Wait. Here. I forgot about these. You can go turn your family back, now.”

“You had them all this time?!”

“Yeah, I was, uh, kind of mad at you. Sorry.”

“You wonderful mistake of nature!”

 

She embraces him, and he strokes her soft feathers in return. For a moment, it’s like the rest of the terrible night has never happened. But Greg is fast asleep in front of them, and Wirt’s eyes glow with unholy fire.

Beatrice lets go first, and she takes the scissors from his hand and flies out of the room with a “Thank you!”

 

Wirt drags a chair up to the bed to wait for his brother to wake up.

Strange, he doesn’t feel tired at all.

 

________

  


Wirt hears footsteps approaching the room and his shoulders tense in anticipation. The shadow of another person looms closer.

“Wirt?”

The voice is familiar.

“Beatrice?”

The person walks through the doorway. It’s a teenage girl, all gangly limbs and curly red hair, wearing a dress of bluebird blue. She smiles at him widely. He blinks. She’s kind of beautiful.

“Yeah.”

Beatrice hugs him again, and he awkwardly hugs back. She lets go, he lets go, she rests her hands on his shoulders and stares at him, not flinching away from his empty eye-sockets.

 

“I’m going to go find my family, and turn them back. Will you be alright here?”

“Mmhm. I’ll be fine, go get your family.”

 

She smiles softly at him, smaller than before. Her eyes soften. She looks sad for a moment. She almost says something, hesitates. Closes her mouth.

 

“Thank you.”

“You’re welcome.”

 

Beatrice leaves. Wirt watches her go. And well, at least one thing went right tonight.

At least one of them can be happy.

 

_______________

  


At dawn, Greg wakes, blinking sleepy eyes and yawning. Wirt immediately focuses his attention on his little brother. He doesn’t know what to say.

 

“Wirt?”

“H-hi Greg.”

“Where are we?”

“We’re at the old mill. Apparently it used to be Beatrice’s house, before she and her family got turned into bluebirds.”

“Oh. Okay. Hey Wirt?”

“Yeah, Greg?”

“Why do your eyes look funny?”

“Um. I’m the Beast now. It’s kind of a long story, Greg.”

“Does that mean we’re not going home?”

“What, no! We’re getting you home as soon as possible.”

“But what about you, Wirt?”

 

Wirt does not answer. The lantern flame waves merrily on Greg’s bedside.

 

_____

 

Beatrice is gone for a few days. Wirt busies himself with trying to repair more of the house. It didn’t matter before, but now that he knows it’s Beatrice’s, well, that’s different. Greg follows him around, carrying their frog and chattering.

Wirt adjusts to everything being strangely lit by the lights in his eye sockets, he gets used to scooping the lantern up when he walks from room to room. It’s his constant companion. He notices vines growing from behind his ears, from the crooks of his elbows, and he does nothing to stop them. Greg asks when they’re going home. Wirt says Greg can go home any time he wants to. Greg asks when Wirt is going home. Wirt changes the subject, every time.

On the third day Beatrice and her family arrive, a mass of strangers with red hair and freckles and cheerful faces, who sweep Greg and Wirt up in their midst. Greg thrives. Wirt shrinks back, daunted by all the new people. It doesn’t help that he’s also the embodiment of the destructive capabilities of the Unknown. He doesn’t go inside the house much, anymore, except to see Greg. But Beatrice’s family, like Beatrice, is persistent. He helps them rebuild the old mill. They help him find Edelwood, or watch Greg while Wirt is gone. Beatrice’s siblings occasionally tease him about being in love with Beatrice. They treat him with a sort of wary awe, mixed with a impish fondness. Beatrice’s mother packs him lunches and dinners, tells him he’s getting too skinny, without even a regard for his eyes or the growing tendrils.

 

It’s a lot like back home, Wirt thinks, except for all the parts that are completely different.

 

________

 

Beatrice wakes up in the middle of the night with a jolt. A branch had slapped against her window with a sound like thunder. She yawns. She doesn’t remember what she was dreaming about. She does know she’s thirsty. Slowly, so as not to make a sound, she steps out of bed and pads across the wood floors in bare feet. Shoes feel strange after being a bird. Walking with feet on the ground is also unsettling.

The house is strange at night. Shadowy, dark. All the inhabitants unconscious. She walks past her sisters’ bedrooms, her brothers’ bedrooms, and she tiptoes down the dark stairwell. A soft and flickering light comes from the kitchen. Strange, so late at night. Perhaps someone had left an oil lamp burning. Maybe Greg got up for a midnight snack.

 

She walks into the kitchen and stifles a surprised gasp.

 

A dark figure sits at the end of the table, arms folded, head resting on forearms. Glowing half-moon eyes with eyelids at half mast. They widen into perfect circles at her entrance.

 

“O-oh. Beatrice! Hi!”

 

Beatrice looks at Wirt critically, a slight frown on her pink lips. Wirt almost never comes inside, claims he doesn’t want to scare her siblings, that he thinks better outside anyway. She isn’t sure if he’s lying. But here he is, sitting at her old kitchen table with the lantern flickering away in front of him.

 

Wait. Flickering?

 

“Wirt,” she says carefully, “what are you doing with your lantern?”

“Um. Nothing, just watching it, I guess.”

He shrugs.

“Wirt.”

“Yeah, Beatrice?”

“Why is it flickering.”

“Uh.”

 

Wirt looks away from her. He shrugs again. A horrible sinking feeling nestles in her chest.

 

“Wirt,” she says for the third time, her voice charged with an undercurrent of dread.

 

“Are you letting the flame go out?”

“I wanted to...see….what would happen?”

 

He looks up at her again, mouth pulled into a small and apologetic smile. Beatrice scowls at him.

 

“That’s your soul, Wirt, you should be more careful with it.”

“It was just an experiment, alright? We’re out of oil, so.”

“Why didn’t you go grind some? Or get me or someone else to do it?”

“Uh, I dunno. Look, it’s not a big deal, alright?”

“ _Not a big deal?_  No, Wirt Whatever-your-last-name-is, you are not allowed to let the flame go out. Do you hear me? You’re just not allowed, alright?!”

“It’s my soul, Beatrice! I can do what I want with it!”

“Well maybe you shouldn’t be responsible for it then, if you’re just going to let it go out!”

“Beatrice, it’s my choice! And I was just messing around anyway, and besides, do you want me running around turning into a monster?”

“It’s better than you being dead! Don’t you think we’d miss you? What about me, Wirt? What about Greg?”

 

Wirt doesn’t answer. Beatrices rubs her eyes with the palm of her hand. It comes away wet. She walks over to the table and picks up the lantern. Wirt does nothing. She can’t tell if he’s watching what she’s doing. She walks over to the doorway, stoops to pick up the axe

 

“Beatrice? Where are you going?”

“To grind some oil.”

 

She shoulders the axe, and disappears into the night.

 

_______

  


Days turn, shade and sun and fog and rain and snow passing all one after another like leaves falling from branches. The shape of the moon never changes. Wirt doesn’t know how much time has passed. His brother looks taller, older. Wirt wonders if he is undergoing the same change, alongside the vines that are beginning to traverse his body. At first he tried to pull them off, but the absence felt like a searing ache and they only grew back tougher, wirier, so he gave it up as a lost cause, gave up his body as an anchor for the forest’s flora. He tries not to look in mirrors.

 

“Hey Wirt?”

“Hm?”

“Who do you think he was?”

“Who?”

“The Beast. Do you think he had family, friends? Maybe he had a frog! Maybe he was just unlucky, getting lost in the woods.”

 

‘Like us,’ is left unspoken.

 

Greg holds the lantern higher, scanning the nearby treeline for more Edelwoods. He looks away from his brother, but continues to speak.

 

“Maybe he used to be a real person, too.”

 

Wirt stares at Greg with glowing eyes.

 

He mutely follows his younger brother into the dusk.

 

______________

 

That night, they find an Edelwood, weeping from mouths and eyeholes. Inky droplets of oil surround the tree in a ring. Greg steps forward with axe in hand. He sets down his lantern.

 

“Don’t touch that Wirt, or else Beatrice is going to be mad at you again.”

“I’m not going to pick it up, Greg.”

 

Wirt settles down, sits crosslegged against a (normal, non-soul) tree. Greg swings his axe. It’s getting easier every day. Between cuts, they talk, and pretend that there was never any soul in the tree.

 

“Why doesn’t Beatrice want you to have the lantern?”

“That’s not important, Greg.”

“But I want to know! I don’t care if it’s important, it’s interesting.”

“Look, just ask Beatrice about it, okay?”

“Okay.”

 

A branch falls.

 

“I could do that, you know. You’re kind of young to be chopping down trees.”

“Yeah, but it’s fun. Swing, swing, swing.”

“Greg, I’m being serious.”

“So am I, Wirt. Chop!”

 

Chips of wood fly.

 

“Are you and Beatrice dating?”

“What! No! Greg, where would you even get the idea?!”

“I was just asking, cause you spend a lot of time with her, and she’s always following you.”

“I’m totally not dating her, Greg. And if I was, I wouldn’t tell you about it.”

“Are you going to make her a mixtape? Like for Sara? Me and Jason Funderberker could give it to her for you.”

“No, because first of all, we’re not going out, and second of all, I don’t think she has a tape player.”

“Oh. Well, you could always just play her a song on the clarinet.”

“Greg! I’m not going to play anything for her! Well, probably not, I mean if she asked I would but I don’t think she’s going to ask anyway so there’s really no point in thinking about it.”

 

Boughs leaking black oil clutter the forest floor.

 

“I am become the velvet shades of the night, soft I come, unlucky, unwilling. The winding branches, a herald to my ascent, winding limb to limb as a soft sleep cometh.”

“What did you say?”

“Uh, nothing, just talking to myself.”

 

The trunk of the Edelwood falls with a crash and thump.

Greg steps back. Cracks his shoulders.

 

“Well, that’s done! Time to get the wood.”

 

Wirt stands up, brushes leaves and debris from his cloak. He helps his younger brother pile wood into neat-ish stacks and piles. Cut branches are arranged into large mounds.

 

“That’ll last a while, won’t it?”

“Mmhmm.”

 

Greg takes an armful of wood in one hand, and stoops to pick up the lantern. Wirt takes a double armful. It is cold and oil-slick in his hands. It is probably staining his clothing.

The brothers walk into the forest, and the lantern lights their path.

 

________________

 

It is near daybreak. The sun will rise soon, five minutes, maybe ten. Wirt sits with closed eyes next to Greg on the front steps of Beatrice’s house. He leans his head against the door. Greg watches him surreptitiously. His older brother is easier to see in the smooth grey light. Vines wind around Wirt’s limbs, circling his throat, his arms, his chest, creeping up his face. He is paler than he used to be, washed out by lack of sun. Dark hollows have formed underneath his eyes. Starlight void behind his eyelids.

 

“You should go home,” Wirt abruptly says, in his ringing two-tone echo of a voice,

“Go home, and forget about me.”

 

Greg nudges him with an elbow.

“I can’t. Who would refill the lantern?”

“Beatrice. Or the old Woodsman. His daughter. Mom and your dad miss you. Go home, Greg. Please. ”

“I can’t,” Greg says again. “I’m not leaving without you, Wirt. And that’s a rock fact!”

 

Wirt groans, and lays a vine-laden arm over his eyes. It looks uncomfortable. He keeps it there, anyways, blocking all light from already closed eyelids.

“This isn’t a joke, Greg, do you understand what you’re doing here? You’re literally cutting up trees made up of lost souls to grind into oil. Go home.”

Greg tries to smile.

“Yeah, but if I don’t do it, then who would?”

“I don’t know, Beatrice? Beatrice’s family? Hell, I could do it!”

“You’d just let it go out, Wirt, and that’s not supposed to happen. It’s ok, I can do it for you.”

 

“But you don’t need to do this! I d Ŏͬ Ǹ̎͒͂̅͢ T ̈́͊͐̏̓ͯ̾̋͏̶͟  ͧͩ̚̕̕N̵̡̿̏ͩ̔̒͆ ̷́̓̓E̶̍̀ ̵͛̌̎̾̍́͟͠Eͫ̍͌͂̋҉ ̏̽͗̕D̢̢͑̉͑͒̋̌͢ ̢ͥ̈́̽͌ͦ͌ͩŶ͋́̉ ͣͯͥO̷̔͋͊̏̓̎͂ͪ̕ ͯ͋ͫ͊ͮ͞Ư̶ͥͯ͒̔̉͗̅ͮ́̚ ͆ͪ̃͛ͧ̔̈̽ͭ͝T̡͆͜ ̶̏̔͛̍̀̒͜͡O̵̸̎̎͛ ͯ̅ͫ̚D͌ͭ͆̐̓̑̄̚͢ ͋͋ͬÖ̴̸̎̈́ͫ̎̓͋͞ ̌̃ͯ͜͟͡T͛̌̊̓̌ ͭͣͯ͊͞H̶̊̀ͮͭ̊̿̃  IŚͮͯ̎҉”

Wirt’s voice turns. The shadows waver and extend. Wirt opens his eyes and his blank white eye-holes vibrate.

Greg stares at his brother, all muscles tense, eyes wide.

Wirt freezes. His voice returns from the eldritch.

 

“I’m sorry. Oh god, Greg, I’m sorry.”

 

He reaches to tentatively pat Greg’s shoulder.

Greg flinches, almost imperceptibly, and Wirt jerks his hand back. He places them back in his lap and clasps them tight.

They sit there in the growing dawn and light washes over them.

 

“Go home, Greg. Please.”

“I can’t.”

**Author's Note:**

> notes:  
> i was very hesitant about posting this because it's not exactly a new idea anymore, but then I rationalized it by being like “well there’s a million fics of coffee shop au and soulmate au and etc au in other fandoms so you know what i’m totally allowed to be redundant.”
> 
> I hope you enjoyed!  
> more otgw and other interwobs shenanigans can be found at kissingyourkismesis.tumblr.com


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